


A Curious Folly

by dracoqueen22



Series: Folly of the Brave [1]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Developing Friendships, Gen, Set Between Episode Four and Five, wound care
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 17:29:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14898902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracoqueen22/pseuds/dracoqueen22
Summary: A shared battle, a shared room, and an exchange of bandages – it’s all in the name of getting to know one another.





	A Curious Folly

**Author's Note:**

> New fandom for me. Cautiously dipping my toes. Characters may be a bit OOC as I find my groove with them. Enjoy!

Molly hisses. “Ow, that hurts you oaf!” It takes concerted effort not to pull away from the source of pain. Or maybe that’s because Fjord’s grip is as strong as iron.   
  
“Then stop squirming and sit still,” Fjord says and though Molly can’t see his face, he can imagine the half-orc rolling his eyes from exasperation. An action which matches the huff of exhaled breath.   
  
Molly sniffs. “I’ve never sat still a day in my life,” he declares as more disinfectant is dotted over the wound, causing another flare of hot pain. Why does this hurt more than drawing blood for his scimitars?   
  
“Maybe you should start,” Fjord drawls, less exasperation this time, more humored. Apparently, he finds Molly entertaining.   
  
Well, at least someone does.   
  
If anyone asks, it’s purely an unconscious reaction that whips Molly’s tail backward, slapping it against Fjord’s beefy thigh. He hears the half-orc hiss a breath, but not comment.   
  
Smug, Molly smirks. “Do hurry,” he says. “I’m bleeding here.”   
  
“As am I,” Fjord retorts.   
  
He’s right, of course. The thick tang of blood is heavy in the air. So heavy Molly can taste it on his tongue, something heavy and brackish for Fjord, something dark and smoky for himself. They are both battered and bruised. They’d thought the devil toad to be the most dangerous of their foes, and it had been the imps who felled both of them.   
  
Ludicrous.   
  
“If you hurry, then I can tend to those for you,” Molly purrs as his skin warms under Fjord’s firm touch, hands gentle for all that they are large, as they wrap the bandages around his body. “It’s all in the name of getting to know one another.”   
  
Fjord snorts. “I’m sure it is.” Warmth – the good kind – floods outward where Fjord’s calloused palms sweep over Molly’s skin.   
  
Tease.   
  
“There,” Fjord says with a pat to the bandages. “It’ll probably scar, but I don’t think you have a problem with those.”   
  
Molly purrs a laugh, rubbing the pads of his fingers over his clavicle, where the thin weals criss-cross over his skin like fallen straw. “They’re badges of honor,” he says, before he hops up from the edge of the bed, his robe peeled open, himself bare from the waist up.   
  
He spins to face Fjord and winks salaciously. “My turn.” He snaps his fingers, tail twitching madly behind him. “Off with it then.”   
  
Fjord rolls his eyes again, sighs dramatically, but tugs at the ties to his shirt, easing it away from his torso with slow, pained movements. The blood’s had time to dry, tacky and maroon, and it starts seeping sluggishly without the fabric to clot the wound. Dark lines spiderweb outward from the wound, bruises from the poison.   
  
Fjord moves gingerly. Molly doesn’t pretend he’s not watching. What? He can’t enjoy a good view when it’s in front of him? Fjord makes a pretty package.   
  
“You look like you want to eat me,” Fjord grunts. “Think you can manage to bandage me up first?”   
  
Molly crosses his arms. “Oh, I don’t know,” he drawls with a tilt of his head. “Pain is just a little spice if you ask me.” He grins, baring his teeth. He knows the stories.   
  
He’s not a vampire, but it’s fun to pretend.   
  
“Weren’t you just the one whining ‘ow’ to me over some antiseptic?” Fjord raises a dark brow, wrinkling the scar running through it. Molly’s curious about said scar. Wants to know how he got it. Interesting shape, that ‘x’. Interesting especially Fjord didn’t lose an eye.   
  
Fjord tosses his torn, bloodied shirt aside. His muscled torso gleams in the lamplight.   
  
It’s a totally inappropriate time to want to lick him. Molly barely knows Fjord. Not that a lack of knowing has stopped him before. It’s just that… this time is different. Because Fjord is Team now, and one doesn’t shit where one eats.   
  
If there’s to be any licking, it’ll have to be after a bit of knowing.   
  
Fjord has scars along his torso also, and Molly admires those. He doubts they are as deliberate as Molly’s own, which means they have a story behind them. He wonders if Fjord is interested in sharing.   
  
Molly snatches up the healer’s kit and flicks a finger at Fjord, ignoring the question. “Lean back,” he says. “I can’t bind that for you if you’re hunched over brooding.”   
  
“I don’t brood,” Fjord laughs.   
  
He obeys, leaning back on his palms, the flat planes of his abdomen a pale green wash in the lamplight. Muscles gleam enticingly, and Molly’s utterly delighted he gets to touch them, even if it’s only in the context of binding injuries.   
  
Molly could drag his fingers over those abdominal muscles for hours. Well, after they’ve healed at any rate. The sluggishly pulsing wounds do mar the view a bit.   
  
He plops down next to Fjord, pulls out rag and antiseptic, and twists toward the half-orc. He dabs at the wound carefully, cleaning up dried blood first, all the better to bare the ragged edges of the imp’s strike. Fjord doesn’t have the decency to hiss or squirm at the antiseptic’s application.   
  
How rude.   
  
“Lucky you,” Molly comments. “The imp managed to miss everything important.”   
  
“Isn’t it all important?” Fjord asks, and his belly rises and falls in tune with his breathing. There’s a sparse, dark trail of hair leading toward his trousers.   
  
Molly makes a mental note of it. Purely for research purposes, of course.  
  
“How should I know? I’m not a cleric.” Molly frowns at the bloodsoaked cloth and tosses it over his shoulder.   
  
They’ll have to ask Jester to give it another look in the morning. For now, packing bandages around it will keep him from bleeding out during the night. It’d be quite a buzz kill to wake up next to a dead half-orc.   
  
“You’re doing a fair impression of one right now,” Fjord says.   
  
Molly laughs and turns to gather bandages from the kit. His tail flicks out behind him, the tip bumping Fjord’s shoulder. His skin is warm to the touch, but not over-warm. Not feverish. This is a good thing.   
  
“I am a tiefling of many faces,” Molly declares and digs out another roll. There’s one more wound that needs attention, and then they’ll both be patched for the night. “And all of them are beautiful.”   
  
Fjord snorts a laugh, but at least it doesn’t sound derogatory. “I’m sure they are, but you know, I actually do have a spell that gives me many faces.”   
  
Molly pokes him in the belly, steering clear of the bandages. “Don’t brag.”   
  
“Is it a boast if it’s true?”   
  
“It’s a boast if it’s truth or a lie,” Molly says and flicks Fjord with his tail though it then chooses to curl around Fjord’s upper arm, giving him a squeeze.   
  
That Fjord doesn’t immediately jerk away and glare at Molly as if he’s evil incarnate at the touch is multiple points in the half-orc’s favor.   
  
He does, however, look at the tail slithering out from around his arm and lift his burly eyebrows. “Is your tail flirting with me?”   
  
Molly laughs and pins the last of the bandaging in place. “The damn thing has a mind of its own. You’ll have to ask it.” Said appendage slithers back into the safety of his trousers, tucking against his leg as though trying to hide.   
  
“And where do I direct my query? Your ass?”  
  
Molly’s shoulders shake. “Well, you can try, but you might not like the answer you get.” He slides his fingers carefully along the bandages, checking them for tightness. “There. All better, if I do say so myself.” He pats Fjord’s shoulder and withdraws.   
  
“Why thank you, nurse,” Fjord drawls. He reaches for his shirt and frowns at the disheveled nature of it.   
  
“You could always go shirtless,” Molly says, flippant. “I doubt there’s anyone who’d mind the view.” He lifts his eyebrows, pointedly looks Fjord up and down.   
  
He expects a blush. And he’s definitely rewarded with one. It’s cute, how Fjord’s skin flushes a darker evergreen.   
  
“Probably,” Fjord says. “But it’s a bit too cold for that, I think.” His eyes flick over Molly. “Don’t think we’re the same size either.”   
  
“Pity.” Molly’s tail twitches aside as he drops down onto his own bed, flopping over the narrow mattress and claiming every inch of space he can. “Nott would be delighted to go shopping with you in the morning, I should think.”   
  
Fjord barks a laugh. “And I’ll spend half my time watching her sticky fingers.”   
  
Molly buries his face in the pillow, and his reply comes out muffled. “Shirtless it is,” he says, and grimaces against the smell of cheap linens and decaying hay and unwashed bodies.   
  
He hears Fjord dig around in his bag, hears the telltale sniff of someone testing previously worn clothes to see if they can manage another week of close contact. Fjord must have found something less rank than the rest, because Molly hears the rustle of him pulling it on.   
  
“Pity,” Molly mutters.   
  
Fjord chuckles and the opposite bed creaks as he lowers himself onto it. “I know you were enjoying the view and all, but it really is too cold to be wandering around half-clothed.”   
  
“Maybe next time.” Molly’s shoulders twitch.   
  
Now that he’s horizontal and immobile, the exhaustion sets in. His wounds ache, despite Fjord’s gentle tending, and all he wants is to sleep, sleep, sleep until the memory of his pseudo-family shattering becomes as distant as all the other things he can’t remember.   
  
Something soft and warm drapes over him.   
  
Molly turns his head, horn dragging against the pillow. A blanket? Fjord’s covered him in a blanket?   
  
“Too cold to sleep shirtless,” Fjord grunts as he plops back down onto his own bed. “Don’t want you catching ill, you know.”   
  
Molly stares at him, for a moment devoid of words except he knows that the laws of polite society dictate he should express his gratitude. The blanket would not have been unexpected from Toya or Oorna or Bosun. But from Fjord, who he barely knows, it is unexpected indeed.   
  
Welcome, yes. But still unexpected.   
  
“It smells,” Molly says, not because it’s unpleasant, but just a statement of fact, and Molly doesn’t know what else to do with this kindness.   
  
“My mistake,” Fjord says and rises, reaching out. “I’ll take it back.”   
  
“No.” Molly rolls and takes the blanket with him, cocooning himself inside the soft fabric. “It’s mine now.”   
  
“Well, I loaned it to you not--”  
  
“Mine. Now.” Molly promptly shuts his eyes and waits for Fjord to protest further, the warmth of the blanket as welcome as the intention behind it.   
  
Fjord huffs but remarkably doesn’t protest. Instead, he douses the lamp and flops down on his own bed, covers rustling as he slides beneath the cheap blankets.   
  
For all that they are strangers, it feels companionable.   
  
Molly buries his face against the blanket once more, breathing in the scent of sweat and cheap soap and leather oil and the strange, indefinable something his senses have labeled Fjord.   
  
“Good night, Molly,” Fjord says.   
  
Molly hums into the pillow.   
  


***

**Author's Note:**

> Fjord is so not getting that blanket back. ;)
> 
> Feedback as always is very welcome, encouraged, and appreciated. Especially for this, my first Critical Role fanfic.


End file.
